Golf Club Fitting
Stress contours for a ball-head collision.
Mechanical Engineering
The game of golf has a wide variety of swings and equipment in play, creating a need for matching the right driver, hybrid, irons, wedges, and ball to the individual player. To fill this need, Professor Mase is finding an algorithm that fits a golf club to a player. In his research, he decreases the variability of individual swings by using a robot to measure the performance of the golf clubs. Initial conditions of the ball (velocity, launch angle, spin) is used as the golfers' representation rather than their swing. This research involves measuring many static club parameters such as center of gravity, moment of inertia, head and shaft weight, shaft flex, swing weight; dynamic measurements involve shaft frequency and hitting performance on the robot. From this data, algorithms are made to get the right equipment into a player's hands given the initial spin, launch angle, and velocity that his/her ball has.
Contact: Tom Mase
Phone: 805-756-7675
Email: gmase@calpoly.edu